Dana Delany

Dana Delany is an American actress born on March 13, 1956, in New York City, the daughter of Mary Burnett Welles, an interior designer, and John Joseph Delany, CEO of Coyne & Delany Co., a plumbing manufacturing firm. She has a sister, Corey, and a brother, Sean, and was raised Roman Catholic. Though she grew up in Stamford, Connecticut, she attended Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, for her senior year, becoming part of the school's first co-educational class. During that year she played the lead role of Nellie Forbush in the school's spring production of South Pacific opposite Peter Kapetan as Emile, and she graduated in 1974 with a nomination to the school's chapter of the Cum Laude Society, an honor awarded that year to 80 of 378 graduating seniors. She went on to major in theater at Wesleyan University, where she appeared in one of the first performances of María Irene Fornés's feminist play Fefu and Her Friends and worked summer stock productions during vacations before graduating in 1978.

Following college, Delany pursued acting work in New York City, appearing in daytime soap operas including Love of Life and As the World Turns while supporting herself through commercial work. Her Broadway career spanned 1980 to 1995, during which she appeared in two productions: A Life and Translations. She also earned critical recognition in 1983 for Nicholas Kazan's off-Broadway production Blood Moon, where The New York Times cited her handling of a demanding dual role with what the paper called "skillful verisimilitude." She subsequently relocated to Hollywood, where she accumulated guest appearances on television series including Moonlighting, Magnum, P.I., and Thirtysomething.

Delany's career shifted substantially when she was cast as nurse Colleen McMurphy on the ABC drama China Beach, which aired from 1988 to 1991. The role brought her two Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series, in 1989 and 1992, along with two additional Emmy nominations and two Golden Globe Award nominations. In 1991, People magazine named her one of the 50 most beautiful people in the world.

Throughout the 1990s, Delany worked across film, television, and theater. Her film credits during the decade included Light Sleeper (1992), Tombstone (1993), in which she played Josephine Marcus opposite Kurt Russell's Wyatt Earp, Exit to Eden (1994), Fly Away Home (1996), and the television films The Margaret Sanger Story (1995), True Women (1997), and Resurrection (1999). She also appeared in the CBS television film Donato and Daughter (1993), directed by Rod Holcomb, in which she was paired with Charles Bronson as his daughter, both playing police officers investigating a serial killer. In addition to her screen work, she established herself as a voice performer, providing the voice of Lois Lane in Superman: The Animated Series, Justice League, and Justice League Unlimited, a role she portrayed intermittently over a span of 17 years, giving her the longest tenure of any actress playing the character. In 1995, she returned to Broadway in Translations, and in May 1997 she served as an artist-in-residence at her alma mater Phillips Academy, working with theater students.

In the 2000s, Delany appeared in leading roles on several television series, including Pasadena (2001), Presidio Med (2002–2003), and Kidnapped (2006–2007). From 2007 to 2010, she starred as Katherine Mayfair on the ABC series Desperate Housewives, a role for which she received a Prism Award in 2009. She subsequently starred as Megan Hunt on the ABC medical drama Body of Proof from 2011 to 2013, and as Crystal Harris on the Amazon Prime Video drama Hand of God from 2014 to 2017.